Considered a satirist, travel writer, and lecturer, Twain was rarely presented as a poet or appreciator of poetry to the public during his life - and still today many people assume an antagonistic relationship between Twain and verse.  In fact, Twain penned 120 poems (the bulk being of a humorous nature) and was an avid reader and performer of Robert Browning's works.  Additionally, Twain was clearly familiar with the popular poets of his era as he frequently parodied them within his novels.  This lecture will discuss how Twain enjoyed not only reading bad poetry, but also writing marginalia within his personal poetry collection - often consisting of snarky remarks criticizing the sentimental tone or rhyming structure - illustrating his active investment in altering and questioning the text as an enjoyable activity.  In fact, Twain solicited editions of bad poetry from his friends and admirers with the express purpose to criticize them, and several of these copies are held today by the Elmira College Mark Twain Archive.

Lisa McGunigal is a Vistiting Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Hope College.  Her research examines the intersection of performance studies and nineteenth-century literary realism, focusing on how authors adopted and adapted strategies from performance sites in their novels to interrogate societal attitudes about race, class, and gender.  She was a 2019 Quarry Farm Fellow, and her work has appeared in several journals, including the Mark Twain Annual and American Literary Realism.  Lisa received her B.A. from University of Rhode Island, M.A. from University of Virginia, and Ph.D. from the Pennsylvania State University.